The great comedian, director, writer, actor, and illustrator—let's just say it: genius—Pierre Étaix has died at the age of 87.Here is the Notebook's (too limited) coverage of Pierre Étaix over the years:David Cairns on Pierre Étaix, with some commentary from the master himselfAdrian Curry on Pierre Étaix's illustrations for Jacques Tati and the posters for his own filmsDavid Cairns on The Nightmare of Méliès (1988)
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Editor’s note: This article is presented in partnership with the Holland Marketing Alliance and their award-winning “Holland. The Original Cool” travel series. You can watch their new short film, “The Tale of Kat & Dog: A Holland Cool Movie,” below.

Try as some filmmakers might, it’s impossible for a single movie to represent an entire country. With all the different perspectives and geographical locations that a nation has to offer, it’s difficult to pinpoint all of those diverse experiences in a neat package.

Luckily, the Netherlands has decades of history and cinematic depictions to dive into, from Dutch filmmakers and those telling their stories far from home. The short film that got us thinking about this? “The Tale of Kat & Dog: A Holland Cool Movie,” a 17-minute tour across Amsterdam with an adorable canine as a guide:

As an actor, assistant director and gag writer, Pierre Étaix worked with everyone from Jacques Tati to Jerry Lewis. If you had to sum up his life in a single word, “clown” is the one that first comes to mind. Photo: Laurent Koffel From humble beginnings in the circus and music hall to celebrated writer, actor and director Pierre Etaix who died yesterday (14 October 2016) at the age of 87 carved a unique place in French cinema.

As an actor, assistant director and gag writer, Pierre Étaix worked with everyone from Jacques Tati to Jerry Lewis. If you had to sum up his life in a single word, “clown” is the one that first comes to mind.

Étaix’s work in the circus, in music-hall, in film, his writings and in his visual imagery all testify to his being a worthy heir to a long clowning tradition which he has successfully transmuted into his films,
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Although physical comedy in cinema lessened with the coming of sound, the tradition of slapstick was kept alive, principally by the American actor Jerry Lewis and the Frenchmen Jacques Tati and Pierre Etaix. Etaix, who has died aged 87, was directly inspired by his compatriot Max Linder, the first internationally celebrated film comic, and Buster Keaton. In fact, on the principle that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, Etaix was not beyond pinching sight gags from his idols. He managed to create a distinct and personal oeuvre as director-actor, though with regrettably few films – only five features, including one documentary, and four shorts. One of the short films was awarded an Oscar.

This relatively sparse filmography as director was due to various reasons, one being Etaix’s painstaking methods and the necessity of precise comic timing. (The even more
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Pierre Étaix, the French clown, actor, and film director who won an Oscar for his 1962 short film Happy Anniversary and counted some of the world’s greatest filmmakers among his loyal fans, has died. Le Monde reports that the cause of death was an intestinal infection. Étaix was 87.

Born in 1928 in Roanne, Étaix initially studied to be a graphic designer, a background that he would often draw on for his act and subsequent film work. Influenced by the silent comedy of the stone-faced Buster Keaton and the dapper Max Linder, he established himself in the music halls of Paris in the early 1950s.

There, he caught the attention of actor-director Jacques Tati, who hired Étaix to come help him write gags for Mon Oncle (1958), his celebrated second outing as the clumsy, pipe-smoking Monsieur Hulot. Étaix was closely involved in the years-long process of developing the film ...

Le Monde reports that Pierre Étaix, the Oscar-winning French comedian and filmmaker, has died at the age of 88. He’s best known for his acclaimed short- and feature-length films in the 1960’s, all of which were tied up in rights disputes for over 20 years until their eventual restoration and revival in 2012, courtesy of Janus Films. These films include “Le Grand Amour,” “As Long as You’ve Got Your Health,” “Land of Milk and Honey,” “Rupture,” “The Suitor,” and “Yoyo.”

Read More: A Comic Master Gets His Due

Étaix began his career as a designer before meeting director Jacques Tati in 1954 when he worked as a gagman and assistant director on his film “Mon Oncle.” His apprenticeship with Tati eventually led to his collaboration with Jean-Claude Carrière, whom he wrote his short film “Happy Anniversary,” which won the Oscar for Best Short Subject in 1963. Étaix and Carrière would collaborate on the
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NEWSAndrzej WajdaJust under a month since his latest film, Afterimage, received its world premiere at the Toronto International Film Festival, the great Polish director Andrzej Wajda (Ashes and Diamonds, Man of Marble) has died at the age of 90.How precious two minutes of film can be! The Czech national film archives have identified a previously lost film by Georges Méliès, says The Guardian: "The two-minute silent film Match de Prestidigitation (“conjuring contest”) from 1904 was found on a reel given to the archives by an anonymous donor, labelled as another film."The digital home of films in the Criterion Collection have moved around over the years, and, as of October 19, will find a new access point as an add-on subscription to Turner's new streaming service, FilmStruck. The service launches October 19.French director F.J. Ossang has surprisingly turned to crowdfunding to finish his new feature, 9 Doigts ("9 Fingers"). Shot in black and white 35 mm,
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Premiering at Cannes earlier this year and soon stopping by Nyff, Bertrand Tavernier‘s Journey Through French Cinema is a 190-minute trip through the history of the cinematic medium in his country. While we’re still awaiting a U.S. release date, the first trailer has now arrived hailing from — you guessed it — France, thankfully with some English subtitles, and it looks to be a delectable treat for anyone with even a passing interest in film.

Check out the trailer below, along with the trailer for a George Méliès exhibit running
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MoonlightDear Danny,As I type this final entry in a state of literal suspension—aboard my flight home, between a rainy Canadian morning and a muggy Californian afternoon—I begin to wonder whether my festival choices were too safe. I read your takes on experimental works with pleasure, as well as a hint of envy toward your adventurousness. My sole excursion this year into Wavelengths territory was Sergei Loznitsa’s Austerlitz, which I admired more than you. Concentration-camp tourism understandably dismays the sober director of My Joy, yet there’s a mordant edge to his unbroken views of visitors, including teeming long-shots that resemble Jacques Tati frames. People amble through these zones of unspeakable suffering as if at a particularly prosaic mall, guides barely hang on to their groups’ attention (“Folks, could you not eat in here, please?”), knowledge is shaky and selfie-sticks are ubiquitous. Still, I thought Loznitsa’s
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French writer-director-actor Jean-Claude Carrière is to receive this year’s Efa Lifetime Achievement Award.

He will be honorary guest at the 29th European Film Awards Ceremony on 10 December in Wroclaw.

Carrière started out writing short novels based on the films of Jacques Tati. Through Tati he met Pierre Étaix with whom he made several films, among them the short Happy Anniversary (1962), which won them an Oscar.

The Telluride Film Festival is a master class in multitasking. It’s easy to envy people like director Rian Johnson and podcaster Karina Longworth, who are staying with producers (and part-time Telluride residents) Frank Marshall and Kathleen Kennedy; they have the luxury of watching rare classics like Fritz Lang’s “Spies” on the big screen.

For others, it’s a frenetic time.

At the film festival opening day Patron’s Brunch, last year’s tributee Rooney Mara (“Carol”) rubbed elbows with Kenneth Lonergan and this year’s tributee Casey Affleck. Mara is back with acquisition title “Una,” adapted by Australian director Benedict Andrews from the David Harrower play about a woman reconnecting with an older man (Ben Mendelsohn) she had sex with years before. Several distributors are checking out the film, which has found a rapturous reception in its premiere.

The Telluride Film Festival is a master class in multitasking. It’s easy to envy people like director Rian Johnson and podcaster Karina Longworth, who are staying with producers (and part-time Telluride residents) Frank Marshall and Kathleen Kennedy; they have the luxury of watching rare classics like Fritz Lang’s “Spies” on the big screen.

For others, it’s a frenetic time.

At the film festival opening day Patron’s Brunch, last year’s tributee Rooney Mara (“Carol”) rubbed elbows with Kenneth Lonergan and this year’s tributee Casey Affleck. Mara is back with acquisition title “Una,” adapted by Australian director Benedict Andrews from the David Harrower play about a woman reconnecting with an older man (Ben Mendelsohn) she had sex with years before. Several distributors are checking out the film, which has found a rapturous reception in its premiere.

No modern comedy group has shown as much commitment to resurrecting the spirit of classic slapstick than Brussels-based husband-and-wife comedy duo Dominique Abel and Fiona Gordon. They have performed for decades, but only brought their talents into feature-length filmmaking in the last 10 years, with films like the wordless “Rumba” and “The Fairy” showcasing their commitment to a humor otherwise absent from contemporary cinema. Their lanky figures are ideal vessels for deadpan visuals that mine territory ranging from Charlie Chaplin to Jacques Tati. “Lost in Paris,” their fourth effort (and first without co-director Bruno Romy), continues that earnest commitment to the genre by tapping into the material’s appeal without reinventing it.

Abel and Gordon have yet to produce a full-bodied work with more originality than references, and “Lost in Paris” doesn’t move the needle in that regard. But it’s another charming doodle that does justice to their brand of studied humor.
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Martin Scorsese‘s latest cut of Silence clocks in at 195 minutes. It’s expected to be released by the end of the year.

This is a very delicate comparison. First, because Chaplin has made (and made well) over fifty films while I made (and failed) with two short films, and almost succeeded with two long films. So you see, it is difficult for me to speak of Chaplin; and
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In the dedication of his immensely beloved 1943 novella, “The Little Prince,” author and aristocrat (and aviator) Antoine de Saint-Exupéry made a passing remark that succinctly captured the soul of his story: “All grown-ups were children first (but few of them remember it).” While the unique locations and landscapes of Saint Exupéry’s tale might seem to resist adaptation — this is, after all, a narrative that splits its time between the Sahara Desert and a galaxy of tiny asteroids suspended in the stars — there’s a good reason why it’s been reimagined as everything from an opera, to a ballet, a stage play, an anime, a pop-up book, a graphic novel, a television series and a rather terrible live-action film by “Singin’ in the Rain” director Stanley Donen. Despite a multitude of logistical hurdles, the fundamental essence of “The Little Prince” is so pure that the narrative has proven capable
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With Island City, director Ruchika Oberoi presents a tryptich of stories dealing with oppression and alienation in the modern island city of the title, Mumbai. In the first story, “Fun Committee”, Vinay Pathak is perfect as Suyash Chaturvedi, the corporate drone working at Systematic Statistics. The company’s Fun Committee has decided that the best way to combat declining productivity is to subject its employees to orderly, organized, obedient fun. Chaturvedi is taken to the mall in the company “Fun Van”, given an envelope of coupons, and a set of instructions that he is required to follow to maximize his fun. An accidental swap of coupons with a terrorist undergoing a similar experience has him mindlessly gathering the pieces of a rifle and putting them together, something he seems to find more engaging, at least, than gathering up pink teddy bears and riding the carousel in the mall.

Originally set for Paramount release March 18, Netflix will stream the animated movie August 5—and, Netflix tells Indiewire, they will open the movie day and date in theaters in advance of a full-scale Oscar campaign.

Since then Osborne has attended 12 international premieres and the $80-million movie has grossed more than $100 million around the world. Designed from the start as an English-language film that would be dubbed for foreign countries, “The Little Prince” succeeded overseas, doing best in China ($25 million), Italy ($10.5 million) and France ($12 million), where it won the Cesar for Best Animated Feature.

Even so, just after the film opened in Canada on March 11, Paramount abruptly pulled it from theaters,
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Originally set for Paramount release March 18, Netflix will stream the animated movie August 5—and, Netflix tells Indiewire, they will open the movie day and date in theaters in advance of a full-scale Oscar campaign.

Since then Osborne has attended 12 international premieres and the $80-million movie has grossed more than $100 million around the world. Designed from the start as an English-language film that would be dubbed for foreign countries, “The Little Prince” succeeded overseas, doing best in China ($25 million), Italy ($10.5 million) and France ($12 million), where it won the Cesar for Best Animated Feature.

Even so, just after the film opened in Canada on March 11, Paramount abruptly pulled it from theaters,
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